PHILADELPHIA -- If the 76ers were the doodle on the back of a kid's notebook, they would be the one with the rainbows and unicorns.

For a professional sports team, the Sixers are about as 1950s sitcom as it gets. They are prayer group over police report; they are popcorn and a college basketball game over champagne and a dimly lit nightclub.

That said, the past few weeks had brought a little bit of a dark cloud to the proceedings. They have been sputtering offensively, spewing serious black smoke out the tailpipe in the final minutes of close games.

Like most blemishes, they need to reach a head, then the pressure needs to be released.

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Wednesday morning it reached a head -- a weird one -- and by Wednesday night, the Sixers were completing a 103-71 thumping of the Celtics.

The man at the center of the controversy in the morning was Evan Turner. And the hero of the night was Evan Turner.

Turner, making his second start since Doug Collins decided to shake things up, had a career-high 26 points and nine rebounds, and did much of the damage while outplaying Rajon Rondo, a guy who over the weekend had a game in which he had 18 points, 20 assists and 17 rebounds against the Knicks.

Against Turner, he had five points, eight assists, one rebound and absolutely no idea how to handle this assignment.

"Evan," Collins said, "was absolutely fabulous."

With the 76ers in the midst of a freefall, Wednesday morning brought with it an odd slice of controversy.

Oldest-school Philly scribe Stan Hochman stirred up some angst in Sixerville with bombshell so vague that Jackson Pollack couldn't have bettered it if he was designing mortars for the Defense Department.

According to Hochman during a spot on the WIP Morning Show, there was a reason why Evan Turner's minutes have been spotty -- but he can't say why. It's a secret. But it will come out. But not now. Maybe tomorrow.

It was a particularly weird piece of vagary. It's not a secret that Collins and Turner have had a little friction. Turner wanted to start, and Collins resisted.

Hochman's Turner talk made it sound as if Turner's problem wasn't about performance or persona, but some sort of a disease -- what, cooties?

That sideshow gave Collins a reason to challenge his team, and Turner.

"I said before the game, 'If we are looking for excuses, we've got them. We've been struggling, and now Thad (Young) is out,'" Collins said. "And now we have a little situation with Evan, a little bonfire ... and if you want to use it as an excuse to lose, we can always do that."

Instead, the Sixers steamrolled a Boston team that could have moved percentage points ahead of them in the Atlantic Division with a win.

Turner ran the show, getting defensive rebounds and bringing the ball up the floor. When he wasn't running the point, he was getting on the low post against Rondo, taking lob passes from Andre Iguodala and scoring at will.

After the game Collins remarked that Turner's A-game is similar to Magic Johnson's. It's what Wisconsin coach and Chester product Bo Ryan said about Turner hours after he was drafted two summers ago.

However, in order to play a Magic Johnson-style game it requires massive responsibility. And midway through his second season, Collins finally decided it was worth the risk to see if Turner was mature enough to handle it.

And coming off a 1-for-12 shooting debacle in Milwaukee Monday, Turner responded in a must-win game.

"You always have to gain the trust of your coach," Turner said. "But I think the most important thing is to gain the trust of your teammates. There were moments when I started off good where they came up and said, 'Keep going. Keep going.' And I think that means a lot when you get that respect from your peers, and they want to see you do well."

And for a team not used to dealing with foreboding images inside its bucolic world, Turner responded clearly, without mystery, without drama.